Design Better Drug Delivery Systems and Discover Better Targets Using AI/ML and Computational Biology

Lovisa Afzelius is an origination partner at Flagship Pioneering. A computational scientist by training, she brings to Flagship two decades of leadership experience in emerging biotechs and large pharma companies, and a passion for data-driven drug discovery. Dr Afzelius has served as CEO, co-founder, president, board chairman and executive director in emerging biotech and large pharma companies. She joined Flagship in early 2020, leading innovation as co-founder and founding CEO of Alltrna, Apriori Bio, Metaphore Biotechnologies and Prologue Medicines. Before joining the Flagship ecosystem, Dr Afzelius built and led Pfizer’s systems immunology function and served as executive director of clinical programs. In 2017, she co-founded Elsa.science, a digital health company for which she serves on the board. Dr Afzelius began her career at AstraZeneca and has received numerous accolades for her work, including being named one of the 100 “most influential persons under 40 in Sweden” by the business magazine, Affärsvärlden. In 2022, Dr Afzelius, was named one of the 20 women blazing trails in biopharma Endpoints for her work with companies using AI and machine learning to advance drug development. In 2023, Apriori Bio was named a Technology Pioneer by the World Economic Forum and received an honorable mention for Fast Company’s World Changing Ideas list in the Rapid Response category. Apriori’s co-founder and CEO, including at Apriori. She holds a PhD in computational chemistry from Uppsala University, a Master of Science in integrative pharmacology from Gothenburg University as well as an MBA from MIT.

Vikram Agarwal completed his PhD in Dr David Bartel's lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he utilized computational approaches to study the principles of microRNA targeting. He completed his post-doctoral research in Dr Jay Shendure's laboratory at the University of Washington, where he applied deep learning methods and massively parallel reporter assays to investigate the mechanisms of transcriptional gene regulation. Transitioning into industry, Vikram worked at Calico Life Sciences LLC, an Alphabet company whose mission is to better understand the mechanisms underlying human aging. There he applied deep learning methods with Dr David Kelley to better understand transcriptional and post-transcriptional gene regulation as well as its link to human genetics. He is currently the Head of mRNA Platform Design Data Science at the mRNA Center of Excellence at Sanofi, where his team is applying machine learning and deep learning methods towards the design of enhanced mRNA therapeutics.

John Quackenbush is Professor of Computational Biology and Bioinformatics and Chair of the Department of Biostatistics at the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health and Professor at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. John’s PhD was in Theoretical Physics but a fellowship to work on the Human Genome Project led him through the Salk Institute, Stanford University, and The Institute for Genomic Research (TIGR), before joining Harvard in 2005. Dr Quackenbush’s research uses massive data to probe how many small effects combine to influence our health and risk of disease. His published work has more than 89,000 citations and among his honors are recognition in 2013 as a White House Open Science Champion of Change and election in 2022 to the National Academy of Medicine. In 2012 he founded Genospace, a precision medicine software company that was sold to Hospital Corporation of America in 2017.

Daniel Reker is a tenure-track Assistant Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Duke University and a Duke Science and Technology Fellow. He holds a BSc with honors in Computer Science and a MSc with honors in Computational Biology and Bioinformatics. He received his PhD from the Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences at ETH Zurich and conducted his postdoctoral work in drug delivery as a SNF Postdoctoral Fellow with Bob Langer and Giovanni Traverso at MIT. Daniel has been named Forbes 30 under 30 in Science and Healthcare and has this year been recognized both as a National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering “Trailblazer” and as a National Institute of General Medical Sciences “Outstanding Investigator”. At Duke, he has built an integrated experimental and computational laboratory to conduct active machine learning campaigns with applications in drug discovery and drug delivery.

Annette Bak, Ph.D., MBA leads Advanced Drug Delivery at Astra Zeneca and serves on the Pharmaceutical Sciences leadership team. Advanced Drug Delivery has the mission to transform diverse modalities, small molecules and new modalities alike, into investigational medicines and is a global organization based in Sweden, UK, and US.Since joining AstraZeneca in 2016, Annette has been instrumental in delivering new modality formulations for clinical studies, notably VEGF mRNA for cardiac regeneration, building intracellular drug delivery capabilities, and sponsoring initiatives on augmenting drug discovery with artificial intelligence. Annette previously worked for Amgen and Merck in the US with responsibility for small molecule and peptide formulations, building outsourcing partnerships in China, in licensing and partnership evaluations, and contributing to getting small molecule therapies to the market.Annette has published more than 40 articles, has more than 35 invited presentations, and serves on the editorial board for the Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences. She holds several patents for pharmaceutical technologies enabling drug delivery of small molecules and biologics.A key volunteer in American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS). She is the President for the association and responsible for leading implementation of  the 2021-2025 strategic plan and ensuring that the AAPS communities are thriving. Annette was the 2020 co-recipient of the AAPS Alice E Till Women in Pharmaceutical Science Recognition, honoring women who has made significant contributions to the to the mentorship, advancement, and support of women in the pharmaceutical sciences